


Mercy, Mercy Me

by ThisCatastrophe



Series: Burnt Offerings [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: BDSM, Breathplay, Choking, Cock & Ball Torture, Eroguro, Face Slapping, Guro, Knife Play, M/M, Mutual Masturbation, Power Dynamics, to a mild degree
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-27
Updated: 2018-04-27
Packaged: 2019-04-28 16:47:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14453553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisCatastrophe/pseuds/ThisCatastrophe
Summary: There's a red stain on Kakuzu's last clean shirt. He knows it's Hidan, and he knows what Hidan's been doing to his clothes, but he wants proof.TL;DR, Hidan is forced to jerk off for Kakuzu. Abuse of the best kind happens.





	Mercy, Mercy Me

**Author's Note:**

> A continuation of Murder Murder, again commissioned by [shipcat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shipcat/profile). Contains plenty of harm and violence, some coarse/borderline offensive language, a little bit of selfsuck and hasty aftercare.

In the old days, before his temples were defiled by peaceful men with rose garlands and delicate strings of bells, Jashin ate his fill on prayers. The proto-warriors killed and offered blood for him, stained hands raised to the heavens, beating hearts exposed to cloudy skies.

But times changed, and softer men craved softer gods, and Jashin’s temples fell into disrepair. They were buried under the trappings of other gods, fertility, agriculture, luck, finance, or under tree roots and vines, and forgotten to everyone but Jashin himself.

These days, he could only count on a few fringe worshippers. His lambs, shinobi with creative, violent streaks, weren’t normally the praying types. They gave offerings, and fine ones at that, but they didn’t give their words, their violent thoughts and desires. Jashin, oldest of the old gods, wanted both. These new children didn’t have their hearts in the carnage.

Save one, that is.

He made art from blood, set forth offerings in viscera that put the best calligraphers to shame. He learned the prayers from thousand-year-old texts and memorized them, sang oaths that Jashin hadn’t heard in ages. He wrote his own prayers, careful or off-cuff, opened his heart to the old god in ways nobody else did.

Yes, Jashin was proud to call Hidan his first true priest in centuries. So when Hidan pleads, Jashin listens.

Not always; Hidan is only human, despite appearances, and his human urges aren’t always dignified enough for Jashin to entertain. But he always, always listens. Hidan’s prayers, whether cried openly at the skies or whispered in the small hours of the night, always take precedence.

And one quiet evening, Jashin heard a long-delayed prayer from his favorite devotee, rising like signal smoke from some abandoned corner of the globe, and he gave the world a gentle push in the right direction.

* * *

 

A red pattern spreads across the front of the shirt.

Kakuzu tries to keep his blood pressure down. It’s not the first, the second, the third time he’s found fluids on his clothes. When your partner has a horrible sexual fixation set off by violence, and when you happen to be a violent person, things like this happen.

He’s flattered, honestly, but his wardrobe is suffering. Thankfully, most fluids can be washed out well enough.

Not blood. Not in this amount.

And why is it shaped like a heart?

It’s almost artistic, with very fine lines and curlicues and what Kakuzu thinks are Jashinist invocations all packed together in a cardioid shape. Everything is crisp and sharp; Kakuzu can even make out some of the invocation texts, despite the unfamiliar, ancient cipher that he’s never had a reason to learn. It’s gaudy, but he has to admit it’s well-produced.

It’s also now the single most prominent feature on his only clean shirt.

Breathe in, breathe out, he thinks. Remain calm. The arrangement keeps going as long as you pretend not to notice the obvious signs.

Kakuzu stares at the ceiling.

No. This is too far. The fire’s been lit and Hidan can’t blame the water for boiling.

* * *

 

Hidan isn’t back at the inn until late, when the sun’s already set and the street lanterns are already lit. He would cut an intimidating silhouette, black robe fluttering gently around him, filling the entire narrow path and blocking the dim lamplight, if Kakuzu weren’t already imagining what kind of position he’d soon be in. He lets his partner have a moment to be imposing before they meet on the inn’s porch.

“Old man,” Hidan greets him flippantly, folding his arms. “You’re in the way, you know.”

Kakuzu doesn’t move; it’s a small doorway, and he fills it entirely. “Care to explain to me what happened to my last clean shirt?”

Hidan sighs deeply. “I told Dearest Leader we needed a nurse for you. You probably wore it, your shoes are under—they’re on your feet, nevermind—and your ledger is—” Hidan stopped when the pocket ledger’s cover connected with his forehead. “Well.”

“It’s not senility, brat. It’s you.” Kakuzu returns his ledger to a deep interior pocket and reaches out to grab his partner’s collar. “We’ve got a conversation to hold. Get inside.”

They would make a scene in the lobby if there’s a scene to be made—almost everyone else is already in bed or is too drunk, nursing cheap sake with their heads down, to care about the monstrously tall fellow hauling someone across the room. As such, nobody interferes, and Kakuzu shoves the door of their shared room open, pitching Hidan inside underhanded. Disoriented, Hidan stumbles over his own discarded shoes before landing half-kneeling on one of two twin beds that flank a tiny shared nightstand, which is currently serving as a makeshift armory.

(Four days ago, when they checked in, Hidan nearly threw a fit. “Absolute bullshit,” he called the beds. “What kind of sick innkeep restricts you to some kind of dumb floor pedestal for the night?” Though it pained him, Kakuzu slipped an extra few ryo into the manager’s hands, as he looked deeply offended.

Three days ago, however, Hidan threw himself on top of the comforter with a great leap and found his love for raised beds.)

The door slams shut with a dull thud. Hidan rights himself, sitting on the farther bed, the rumpled one he claimed as his own days ago. “I mean, if you wanted me in bed, you could have just asked,” he grumbles. Kakuzu’s shadow advances until it covers him entirely.

“Show me how,” Kakuzu says. He pitches the shirt unceremoniously at Hidan’s face, watching him flail as he tries to gracefully pin down the fluttering fabric, to regain his dignity before being slapped in the face with a discarded garment.

He barely succeeds without falling sideways and bunches the material in his lap, clenching it into wads. “Show you how what? How to make a shirt? Think you’re gonna change your career at your age?” It’s a bluff, but it sounds like every other play-dumb moment in Hidan’s storied playing-dumb life. He clings to the bluff like he clings to each bluff, whiteknuckled.

“Show me how,” Kakuzu repeats, controlling himself, “ _exactly_ how you made this mess on my clothes.” The room rings with a sudden silence. “And stop playing with me. I know damn well you’re the reason my belongings keep going missing. So show me and pray to your fake god that I don’t kill you after.”

Behind the closed door comes the sound of people, employees, entire lives and identities that, for all it matters to them, don’t have to exist at all. They are transience embodied, and in the few stolen hours that they spend in this inn, Hidan and Kakuzu are themselves transient, moving between instances when their lives make ripples in the universe. They live, for now, in the gaps between events; nothing should change now.

But everything does, because Hidan removes the sleeve of his robe, lets the other one drop low to rest in the crook of his elbow and touches a gentle hand to his collar. “You really want to know,” he said. “You really want to see? I can’t promise you’ll like this.” Hidan beckons for his pike, leaning against the narrow strip of wall between the two twin bets, and lets his hand trail down to the cloak’s closed buttons, springing them open until the fabric rests free in an arc around him, one sleeve and the stiff collar pooling in his lap. “In fact, I can promise you won’t like this. Hand me that pike?”

Lamplight plays on Hidan’s skin, catching fine white hairs in highlighted flashes as his chest moves and setting harsh glares on the bones of his shoulders. Kakuzu, suspicious, leaves his eyes on Hidan and leans sideways to grab the pike. “Don’t ruin the sheets,” he murmurs. Their hands linger together as the pike makes its way back to its owner, and Kakuzu finally sits on the empty bed.

“Since when do you care what I do to rented furniture?” A smile plays on Hidan’s lips; he twirls the pike, palm as a fulcrum, and watches the light sparkle on its polished edges. “Admit it, Kakuzu. You’re curious—morbidly curious, aren’t you—and you’re afraid you won’t control the situation because I’m the only one who knows what’s going on. Am I right?”

As he speaks, Hidan traces the pike’s razorblade tip on his breastbone, lifting pink ridges in its path. Steady, languid motions with a supple wrist bloom into smooth curves ending in tiny curlicues, almost practiced—in one, a loose spiral that recurves at its tail, Kakuzu sees a shadow of the pattern in the shirt, mirrored.

Feigning disinterest in the pattern, Kakuzu leans back on a hand and crosses one leg over the other. He peels back a lip, knowing the sneer won’t show through his mask, but his eyes crinkle menacingly all the same. “You’re overestimating yourself. Vastly. And underestimating me by association.” Kakuzu pauses for a second before leaning forward to brace an elbow on his raised knee. “I’m… interested to see where this situation goes.”

By now the pink pattern fills Hidan’s chest from shoulder to shoulder, ending just above his nipples and circling his throat tight against the base. Each mark darkens to dusky red, standing out from the all-over rose that now dyes his chest. “Are you, now?” he remarks. “Maybe this will be a good conversation, after all.” With a clean, quick motion, he scratches two deep curls down each side of his torso, marking the bottom boundaries of the pattern.

Hidan works more quickly than Kakuzu expected, but the pattern still takes some time to appear. He can’t tear his eyes away, not even to check on the oil lamp, until their light flickers so much that he can’t see the angry pink scrapes. When he refills the oil, he leans back to look at the entire design for the first time; in his rapture, his eyes followed only the pike’s tip, ignoring the space around it.

It’s a huge undertaking, this pattern. Kakuzu realizes now that it populates most of his partner’s chest and stomach, even though the mirror image didn’t take up quite the whole of his ruined shirtfront. The lines quiver gently with the motion of Hidan’s muscles, little ripples across his stomach as his abdominals contract, expansions of the cardioid’s top as he breathes.

A droplet of sweat falls onto his belly and races for the hollow of his hips, following the lines like canal boundaries; Kakuzu finally notices that the rest of the body is indeed drenched. Slowly he traces the lines up to Hidan’s face and watches the blush that spreads to match the color in his chest, looks for the particular path of sweat among so many others. Damp pale hair clings to his cheek; they’ve been entranced for much longer than either one realizes.

“Well?” Hidan breaks the silence. “You want me to…?”

“I want,” Kakuzu begins, then clears his throat. “I want to see the whole process. Keep going.”

Pike in hand and poised, Hidan waits until Kakuzu looks him in the eye before breaking the skin. The lamp’s weak little flame casts shadows on his face while the pike works at one of the ridges; it splits open like ripe fruit, a clean path following the pike for a mere second before the ridge becomes a bloody line, a wound not deep enough to drip but just deep enough to glow brilliant and red.

More ridges become gorgeous outlines. Hidan’s breath judders in his chest, threatening to shake droplets of blood loose and ruin the pattern, but he bites at his lip (Kakuzu watches the teeth pull an equally wonderful pink, then a red from that ruined skin) and keeps his chest still and his hands steady. The pattern winds its way down the canvas.

It’s all Kakuzu can do not to touch the bleeding lines. Something in his mind, something he hasn’t heard in years, begs him to check if the lines will transfer mirrored onto his palm; another softer voice wonders what that line circling Hidan’s throat tastes like. He ignores the incessant pleas and the idle thoughts and focuses on the way the pike skips across Hidan’s tight belly.

Faintly, he’s aware of the little keening noises that Hidan keeps making. He hears the way they change color when the pike’s trail lengthens, notes how their tone matches the color of the blood. Skin judders in sync with the highest peaks of the whimpers; half-swallowed pants and gasps trail after the longest cuts. It’s fine and well-rehearsed theater, this human body.

The cuts near the pattern’s bottom are deeper, and red springs forth quickly to match the beads that have already pooled in the shallow scrapes along Hidan’s chest. When he’s done and the pike is laid aside, Kakuzu silently admires the artistry; a steady hand and an all-too-intimate understanding of blood and wounds give the illusion that this entire pattern was created in one fell swoop, as if stamped from a single stroke of red ink.

Hidan leans back on his palms, straightening his belly to show off the pattern. His face is flushed still, but he looks proud of himself, or as proud as he can look with bitemarks splitting the skin of his lower lip and tiny pools of sweat collecting in the hollows of his neck. “Well, that’s… what you wanted, isn’t it?” he asks, and he lifts a hand to delicately trace beneath a line. An index finger comes away with a slow drop of blood filling the underside of his nail.

“It is,” Kakuzu agrees. “I must admit, I’ve never seen this… shall we say, _skilled_ side of you. You almost seem competent.”

The mood seems ruined for a moment as Hidan scowls, but he tosses his hair off his face and lets his face relax again. “I like to keep my best talents hidden. Playing dumb only works if you commit.”

“Speaking of playing dumb.” There’s a low groan from the ancient bed as Kakuzu leans forward to look closely at Hidan’s belly. “You’re not telling me everything, are you?”

“Hell you mean, old man?”

An elbow shifts to the hollow of Kakuzu’s knee, and his thumb hooks under his chin to prop his head up. “Don’t lie to me. This isn’t where you stopped.” Lights play on sweat and cloth. Outside, a frog croaks solemnly, alone. “That cloak isn’t covering you enough.”

He won’t commit to the motion—that would be a concession of guilt, and of failure—but Hidan quickly glances down at his lap, where the discarded cloak certainly isn’t doing much to hide an erection that’s been growing since the first blood was drawn. “Jealous you can’t get it up, then? I’m sorry for you.” He shifts a leg so that the cloak falls away, revealing strained stitches on his thin trousers. “Got a friend in Yuugakure who sells medicinal herbs for that. Maybe I should—?”

“—Enough. Carry on before I lose my temper.” Kakuzu’s glad, for the moment, for the long tunic he selected this morning in the absence of that shirt. With the tunic and the pose he settles into, his own erection is concealed almost perfectly.

Hidan lets his eyes fall shut as he runs a palm over the thin fabric of his pants. “Oh, but what if that’s what I’m going for?”

There’s no reply—he doesn’t expect one, anyway. He lifts a leg to brace a knee on the bed, opening his hips. The wandering hand moves slowly, indulgently, along his inner thighs and over his concealed cock and in little curved traces against his balls. He pulls the fabric tight on occasion, showing off shapes and contours and, once or twice, the way his heartbeat makes everything throb and move.

The panting and whimpering is gone; Hidan knows he has the upper hand, if only until the fabric’s removed, and he milks the moment for all it’s worth, groaning in his lowest register, humming gently and teasing when he can find the words.

“You noticed, didn’t you? The way I look at you?” he begins, closed lids squeezing just slightly as he tightens his fingers around the base of his cock. “You’re not the only one who knows how to play the long game, Kakuzu.”

“Shut up already,” comes the growl from the next bed, sounding closer than before. Hidan opens his eyes to see Kakuzu’s moved forward, barely seated on the edge, still with a hunched posture and that intense gaze. His free hand, the one that isn’t braced on a knee, is working open the knots at the back of his neck, and his mask eventually falls free, fluttering to the ground. The stitches on his face are pulled tight.

“Hm. Sometimes I forget you’re actually handsome.” Hidan shifts his weight and fumbles with the ties that close his pants. “Don’t suppose you plan on giving me a hand here, do you? Or maybe something else, now that your mask isn’t—”

“—shut _up_.” A hand reaches into the bedside table for a kunai. With a quick, expert motion, Kakuzu slices apart the knotted drawstrings on Hidan’s pants, loosening the laces. They quickly expand, trapping Hidan’s otherwise bare cock under the crossed strings.

Hidan bites at his lips until the broken areas turn purple, tugs at the cut ends of the drawstring to make his cock bounce under the lacing of his pants. “Patience is a virtue, old man.” He works a finger under one of the crossed strings and slips it under the head, then arches to push the shaft through the hole. “Just enjoy the show, okay?”

He takes his sweet time teasing the strings around his dick, rolling his shoulders for effect and moaning in an almost-sarcastic fashion. Kakuzu can’t decide if he’s insulted by the cheap noises or entranced by the gentle thrusts and the way Hidan’s bleeding belly gyrates as he reveals more and more of his cock. One hand itches to reach out and massage his partner’s balls while he performs.

The other hand, meanwhile, craves to slap Hidan’s smug face; this urge he actually follows. He strikes out with a quick jerk that produces a satisfying crack against the pale cheek, and Hidan’s showy moan peaks into a sharper, more real one. While his mouth is open in shock, Kakuzu shoves a pair of fingers past his lips, gripping his chin between the thumb and the last fingers. “Suck, if you’re going to play a cheap whore,” he murmurs.

A tongue spirals around the fingers, then splits them in two. Hidan tries to say something, but it’s muffled by the hand gripping his face; instead, a string of saliva drips from his lip and slides down his chin. Vaguely, Kakuzu is aware of a shift of weight, but he doesn’t notice a difference until Hidan lobs his pants across the room.

With his free hand, Kakuzu slaps his knuckles against one of Hidan’s thighs, prompting him to open his legs again. His hips tilt back to show off a thick cock, too heavy to stand, that lies across the crook of his pelvis, and round, full balls set into fine pale hair. He sighs around the fingers in his mouth when Kakuzu grips a meaty thigh.

“Impressive, I must admit,” Kakuzu grumbles. “Though it’s all for nothing if you can’t use it.” He gives Hidan’s thigh a gentle slap and reaches out to tug at his balls instead.

Hidan’s mumbles start to sound like words, so Kakuzu concedes and removes his fingers to hear him. “I _said_ ,” he repeats, with a little pant as Kakuzu palms his scrotum, “I’ll show you how I use it. Just get on your knees.”

Suddenly, he cries out, pulling against the hand that still grips his chin in place. An angry red shows on his sac where Kakuzu’s hand struck them. He struggles a little at a series of small, sharp taps, though the thick vein on the underside of his cock throbs hard.

Kakuzu removes his hands, wiping the saliva off one on the groin of his pants, before handing Hidan the kunai that’s been abandoned on the bed. “Now get to work,” he growls. “Best make it a good performance.”

Panting heavily, Hidan massages his aching balls, kunai gripped in his fist. “Jashin,” he swears, “you really know how to encourage a body, don’t you?” The massage turns into an open-handed fondle; his balls jump enticingly as he jiggles them and presses them against a rounded thigh. “Fine, I’ll do it this time. But next time, you’re helping me out.”

One of the fingers of his clenched fist unfurls and traces around a nipple, across the curve of his pectorals and through fine bloody lines to reach the other one. “See, like this,” Hidan continues. “Instead of slapping me around.” He pinches the nipple hard and arches, gripping at the root of his cock. “Or, you know. In addition.” For a second, he shuffles on the bed, tipping his hips back even more and bracing a heel against the side of the bed. The lines of the bleeding pattern are obscured when his stomach curls in.

“Here, let me show you something else.” Hidan leans down, chest compressing tight, until he can barely run the flat of his tongue over the head of his own cock, leaving a shining trail of saliva in its path. “Mn,” he groans before sitting back up to let his lungs expand, “See? Next time, old man.”

“You don’t have to beg,” Kakuzu replies, though he’s no longer hiding the hand that works at his erection through his pants.

“But you’re going to make me, huh? I know how you work.” Hidan leans down again to spit on his dick, shuddering at the sensation of saliva creeping down the underside of his shaft. “Self-centered old fuck.” He presses the blade of the kunai into his belly, watching the skin pull tight before it splits.

As Hidan slides his palm over the shaft, spreading a thin coat of saliva along his cock, Kakuzu grips himself, teases with a little pulse of tightness when Hidan’s cockhead disappears into his fist. Wet, lewd noises fill the room as Hidan’s hand works in lazy corkscrews, the lip of the glans peeking occasionally over his fingers.

Kakuzu licks at his lips, suddenly aware of how dry is mouth’s become. He doesn’t want to come before Hidan does, having not yet figured out a way to come first without giving up his tenuous power, so he finds something else to follow. Hidan’s other hand guides the kunai as it connects the ends of the pattern, drawing more and more blood to the surface. It skips back and forth, sending tiny horizontal splatters onto his waist on either sides.

“Kakuzu,” Hidan moans, bringing his partner back to reality. “Hey, help me out here. Come on.” He spins the kunai a little and opens a long, shaking cut on a thigh. “Anything, old man. I’m begging you.”

“You certainly seem to do this on your own enough,” Kakuzu replies. “You don’t need the help.” Nevertheless, he stands to remove his pants, leaving only his fundoshi, pulled away from his skin at one side thanks to his now-full erection.

“How old-fashioned,” Hidan comments. He leans forward, trying to press his face into the cloth, but Kakuzu grabs his hair and holds him in place. A pink tongue runs over bitten lips. “It’s a fashion disaster. Get rid of it.”

“It’s no more a fashion disaster than your refusal to wear any underwear at all.” Kakuzu’s hand crawls around to the back of Hidan’s hair, then pulls hard to jerk his head back. The tented front of his fundoshi brushes against Hidan’s chin as he reaches down to take back the kunai. “I can tell when my clothes have been in your mouth, in any event."

There’s a long moment when Hidan watches, enamored, while Kakuzu tries to untie his fundoshi one-handed while holding Hidan’s scalp steady. However, with the kunai taking up part of his hand, he can’t work the knots open, so he slips the blade into the hollow of one hip and slices it open. It falls away to join his discarded mask, catching for a minute in the hollow between his cock and his belly.

Hidan licks his lips again and pulls against Kakuzu’s hand, straining to press his lips on the bobbing head, but Kakuzu holds him in place. Instead, he grips the base, pressing his free hand into the coarse hair and letting the kunai dangle off a finger, and taps the head against Hidan’s cheek temptingly. “Ready to ruin that pretty face?” Kakuzu murmurs. He doesn’t wait for an answer.

Quick and glittering in the low light, the kunai slips into Hidan’s mouth. It turns on its side, angles downwards, forcing his jaw open and pinning his tongue with its tip. Hidan’s shoulders shake as he works over his cock, and a moan escapes his throat as a bit of saliva-blood rolls down his cheek.

“I could murder you right now,” Kakuzu says. He feels his control evaporating; he wanted so badly to watch Hidan fall apart completely unassisted, but the younger isn’t the only one who’s been restraining himself all this time. It’s a fight against his own desires. Today is the best time, maybe even the only time, to set a tone with Hidan. “I could shove this blade down your throat and split you in half.”

A shudder crawls up Hidan’s spine. “You’ve thought about that, haven’t you? Dying with my hands on you?” Kakuzu trails the kunai out of his mouth and traces its tip under his lower lip. “I’ve never met someone who used their immortality so cheaply. Disgraceful.”

“I am, aren’t I?” Hidan groans. “Does it make you hate me? Wanna destroy me? You know—”

Kakuzu nicks the corner of Hidan’s mouth, matching the wound’s curve to the stitches on his own face. The motion produces a thick, throaty sound that winds away into a whimper, and Kakuzu gives Hidan’s hair a jerk to watch the blood dance.

“Fuck,” Hidan hisses. “More, more. Kakuzu.” He whines, almost sobs as he squeezes his cock. “Shut me up.”

The knife forms an equal cut on the other cheek, then draws a weeping line under Hidan’s cheek. Kakuzu releases his hold on the pale hair and chases the slices with slaps, watching the blood transfer onto his palms and then into reddening prints on Hidan’s cheeks. There’s not enough of a rainbow on the abused face, so Kakuzu grabs Hidan’s throat and squeezes tight until brown and purple marks creep out from under his fingers while strained moans resound from the walls.

There’s a moment when Kakuzu desperately wants to shove his cock down Hidan’s throat, grab his hair and press his face close to his belly. It can’t happen yet. It can’t. It’s far too soon, and Kakuzu steps away, clenching an itching hand into a fist around the kunai. His other hand can’t help but reach for his cock, squeezing the base in an attempt to quiet the desperate throbs.

Meanwhile, Hidan looks like he’s about to fall apart. His mouth hangs open, injured tongue still dripping blood on his chin, and his eyes are half-lidded and disfocused. Sometime while Kakuzu was up close he spread his legs even wider and drew up his knees, showing off the still-red places where his balls were slapped, almost as if begging for another round. The pattern on his torso is almost completely ruined, his chest a confused mess of old and new blood.

A groan bubbles in Kakuzu’s chest without his consent. He presses his fist over his mouth to stifle it, teasing a thumb over his slit. “It’s a wonder,” he says through gritted teeth, “that you can stay hard with all that blood loss.”

“’M used to it,” Hidan whines. No, moans. His voice shakes the same as his thighs. “Makes it… makes it better. Makes y’dizzy.”

“Dizzy, huh.” Kakuzu considers the knife in his hand for a second. “So you like to choke?” He pauses even when he sees a nod from Hidan. “Choke for me, then.”

He rams the blade of the kunai into Hidan’s trachea, jamming it just above his Adam’s apple and sealing the windpipe closed. Hidan’s eyes flutter and squeeze shut; judging by the gurgling, uninhibited noises, he’s close to the edge. The blood escapes in bursts, timed with the throbs in his ruined lips, and collects in the hollow of his clavicle.

Kakuzu watches Hidan struggle against his own advancing blackout. Finally certain he’s not being scrutinized, he pulls the tunic up high on his chest and gives his cock a long, firm stroke. The hand holding his shirt up grabs for a pectoral, squeezing and rolling the muscle, feeling for the way his borrowed heart drives faster and faster beneath his ribs.

He feels his balls draw tighter against his body and, in a sudden rush, Kakuzu holds the tunic in his teeth to free his hand. A thumb shoves Hidan’s mouth open even wider, would run the rise of gagging him if he could breathe, and Hidan’s tongue drops out onto his chin, greedy.

Thick ropes of cum decorate Hidan’s tongue, his cheek, his temple. Kakuzu grits his teeth, eyes closing against his will, and lets his mind cloud over. He thinks about how nice it would have been to feel Hidan’s throat tightening around his cock, how nice it will be someday to pin Hidan over the nearest table. For now, he allows himself only a small last indulgence; he swipes his thumb over the last desperate spurts of cum and shoves the sticky thumb in Hidan’s mouth, gritting his teeth when the eager tongue licks it off.

When he withdraws, Hidan’s stomach is decorated with his own cum, impressively long trails that reach up to his collar. The knife still glitters in his throat, but his eyes flutter gently, wandering over Kakuzu’s exposed body, as he licks at the mess on his cheeks.

He’s beginning to sway dangerously, so Kakuzu reaches out to remove the knife. Exhausted, he lets a length of black fiber fall from his wrist. The interior wounds will close on their own soon, and the cuts on his torso aren’t serious, but the throat needs attention. For a minute he stoops over his partner to stitch up the opening, but Hidan, barely awake, pats the bed beside him and tips sideways.

“Sit still,” Kakuzu chides, but he’s equally eager to lie down. He reclines, and Hidan drapes himself in all the open spaces of the bed.

* * *

 

It’s the middle of the night, and Kakuzu is aware far too late that he fell asleep beside Hidan. Not that he’s opposed to body heat—there’s a creature comfort in entangled arms and the midnight strokes of lazy hands—but he’s seen what Hidan does to sheets and pillows.

Sure enough, there’s a pile on the floor that he assumes is the comforter. Something covers only part of his body; he touches it and finds a thin sheet, oriented the wrong way and pooling on the floor. He finds dried blood on his chest, flaking, and tries to stand to brush it away.

Thick arms encircle his waist, holding him in place, burning into his skin in the stale-aired room. There’s a face pressed into his throat and, he notes with a sigh, drool pooling on his shoulder, though he knows it’s not his own. He reaches for Hidan’s waist and prods gently.

Hidan's waking grumble is thin and weak, as if his windpipe wasn’t fully repaired. One hand wanders to Kakuzu’s belly and slaps at him harshly; Kakuzu coughs in response and jams his shoulder into Hidan’s chin, waking him fully.

“What was that for?” Hidan mumbles. “I was comfortable.”

“And drooling on me,” Kakuzu finishes. “You kicked the sheets on the floor.”

“Deserved it. They were lookin’ at me wrong.”

Kakuzu sighs and, finally allowed to move, sits up to brush the flaking blood off his chest. He reaches down for the ends of the sheet and flaps it to replace it; there’s a glimpse of Hidan’s sprawled body, inviting and warm and very, very naked, in the moonlight, and he has to look away.

“In the morning,” he begins, “we need to check out and move along. There’s nothing significant in this part of the country.”

Hidan presses his face into the pillow, turning on his side to give up a little space. “Could’ve told me that yesterday. Or were you keeping us here just so you could give me a facial?”

“What a crude term.” The comforter flaps noisily over the bed and lands slightly crooked, but Kakuzu doesn’t bother to fix it. “I’d like to never hear that again.”

“Tough shit. Come back to bed.”

* * *

 

He’s down one shirt, one tunic, a fundoshi and a kunai, which worked its way behind the bed in the night and could not be retrieved. The cloak is itchy when there’s no shirt to lift it off his skin, and he doesn’t understand why his partner puts up with it. Said partner looks rumpled and self-satisfied, like someone who’s finally won a long argument, and he won’t stop rubbing up against Kakuzu as they pack up to leave. Kakuzu has had better mornings.

The manager tries to return the extra couple of ryo, but Kakuzu insists. He didn’t bother to report all the blood on the bedsheets, nevermind the discarded clothes they stuffed under the blankets, but he’s not willing to pay the real price for damages. Best to leave on a good note and let him notice the shortage later.

“We should get a couple bento for the road,” Hidan comments on the porch. Kakuzu glances at him between patting his pockets for every small item: ledger, shuriken, wallet. “Or nikuman. Hell, I’ll settle for shioyaki.”

“Hidan,” Kakuzu says. “I swear.” The threat ends prematurely, though. “We’ll find cheap bento. I don’t want to stop again until evening.”

With their cloaks on and Hidan’s scythe hanging on his back, they seem too intimidating for the bento stand owner to haggle with. He asks half the price for one box and offers up two, looking very put-out when Kakuzu asks for another set at the same price. A wife hanging from a nearby window scolds him under her breath as Hidan picks out the four boxes with the most meat.

Outside the town gates, thick clumps of trees shade the road, and little specks of sunlight play on bits of metal and skin. Hidan jogs ahead to crest a hill, settling his hands on his hips.

There’s a moment where his hair flies away from his neck and Kakuzu doesn’t hate him. He’s clever, this young man. He figured out how to work his way into Kakuzu’s better graces almost unnoticed. Kakuzu considers if that’s good or bad, but Hidan looks back and calls out before he finishes the thought.

“Hurry up, old man,” he shouts. “I’ll leave you behind.”

“You’re the one who’ll get left behind,” Kakuzu replies. Hidan waits at the top of the hill for him, pulling the arm of his cloak off his shoulder. Only breezes and birds move for a long time. Hidan nudges his shoulder into Kakuzu’s.

“You really think I have a pretty face?”

“Shut up.”


End file.
